Business Strategy and Marketing Solutions

How To Open The Sales Door With Neuromarketing

  

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Two tips to unlock the sales door and keep it open.

Here is an approach to the seller-buyer interaction that you may not have thought of before, but which can yield substantial benefits. It is based on insights from neuromarketing which, simply stated, helps you understand and reach the parts of the brain that decide (source: neuromarketing blog).

The Buyer Is Hard-Wired To Survive:
What This Means To You
Neuromarketing tells us that we are all hard-wired by our old brain (sometimes called the reptilian brain) to survive. This means, in today's business context, that the buyer (your potential customer) you are calling upon will instinctively (we're looking at as little as 5 milliseconds) process visual and verbal cues to determine if your goal is to eat him or her (figuratively, of course) for lunch. The wrong cues trigger the fight (resistance) or flight response, neither of which is helpful in the sales process.

Eliminate The Threats
For you as the seller to survive, you must eliminate the perceived threats that can trigger fight or flight. Here's how.

First, eliminate the visual threat: Concentrate first on the potential visual threat. The reason for this is that visual cues are processed by the old brain faster than audio cues, and the initial instinctive response may be the dominant one. Is there anything in how you look (grooming, attire, facial expression, or posture) or move that is threatening?

Second, eliminate the verbal threat: Next, point attention to what the buyer can gain, rather than risk, by engaging with you. Do this by liberally using the "YOU" words; "you", "your" and generally any words that fall within the buyer's "what's in it for me" mindset. The science of neuromarketing tells us that one of the most powerful keys to a successful seller-buyer relationship is for the seller to focus on the buyer's self-centeredness. The "you" words do this. "Think of the old brain as the center of "ME," with no patience or empathy for anything that does not immediately concern its own well-being and survival." (Source: Neuromarketing: Understanding The Buy Buttons In Your Customer's Brain, at location 198 in the Kindle version).

While the notion of focusing on the customer is not new, the neuromarketing foundation of it may be. If we learn anything from neuromarketing it's the power of our hard-wired nature, and that it's best not to fool with nature. For this reason, do not begin conversations with an extended thank you, personal bio, company history, corporate brochure, and YOUR accomplishments. Keep the conversation focused on the buyer using "you" and "your" frequently. State how the buyer will benefit in clear and meaningful terms within the first 30 seconds of meeting.

KEY TAKEAWAY
You can't begin a positive buyer-seller relationship until you remove the instinctive threats to your buyer's survival by eliminating the wrong visual and verbal cues.

How do you avoid being perceived as a threat?

Photo Credit: Via Flickr Creative Commons Frank Wuestefeld